DB Class 105

Updated: August 2026 – Some class designations can’t be answered with a data sheet, only with the system behind them. Class 105 is such a case. This page explains how German class numbers are built, why the same figure means different things in two systems, and how you reach a reliable answer on the vehicle itself.

What is DB Class 105?

The designation consists of two parts: a railway administration and a three-digit running number. That’s exactly where the problem lies. A class number is not a technical description, but an entry in a numbering system – and Germany had two such systems running in parallel for decades.

There’s no confirmed build, performance or service data for this specific designation that we could responsibly state here. Rather than invent figures, this page instead explains what actually helps: how to place a three-digit class number, and how to reach an unambiguous identification on the vehicle itself.

Two railways, two systems, one figure

The most important point first: in Germany, a three-digit class number didn’t mean the same thing until 1992, depending on which railway had assigned it.

At the Deutsche Bundesbahn, numbers from 101 to 199 stood for electric locomotives, numbers from 201 for diesel locomotives. Well-known examples are the 103 and the 110 on the electric side and the 218 on the diesel side.

At the Deutsche Reichsbahn of the GDR it was the other way round: there, numbers in the 100 range denoted diesel locomotives, while electric locomotives fell into the 200 range – such as the 211, 242, 243 and 250.

A three-digit figure alone doesn’t even reliably tell you whether it’s an electric or a diesel-powered vehicle. Only stating which system it comes from makes it legible.

On top of that, both systems also had further vehicle groups besides locomotives – railcars, light locomotives, departmental vehicles – each with its own number range. A figure without stating the vehicle group and the railway administration is therefore not a fact, but a search term. That’s exactly how you should treat it: as a starting point for verification, not as a result.

Standardisation after 1992

When both railways merged into Deutsche Bahn AG, the number ranges had to be aligned, since otherwise the same figures would have been assigned twice. Many Reichsbahn vehicles were given new class numbers as a result.

Former DR class	New designation	Vehicle type
243	Class 143	electric locomotive for local services
250	Class 155	six-axle freight locomotive
242	Class 142 (E42)	electric locomotive for mixed and freight traffic
211	Class 109 (E11)	electric locomotive for passenger trains

This has a practical consequence for research: older sources name numbers that no longer exist today. Anyone who can’t find a designation anywhere often hasn’t made a mistake, but is looking at a historical number. How to resolve such cases step by step is described in the guide to identifying classes.

How to reach a clear answer on the vehicle

The short class designation is a shorthand for everyday use. The reliable identifier is something else: the twelve-digit vehicle number under the European standard.

How the twelve-digit number is structured in detail and how to check its check digit is explained in the guide to the UIC number.

Why the designation and reality drift apart

There are several reasons why a class designation doesn’t match what’s standing on the platform – and none of them is an observer’s mistake.

The first is historical. Over more than a hundred years, regional railways, the Reichsbahn, the Bundesbahn, the GDR’s Reichsbahn and finally Deutsche Bahn AG each used their own systems. Vehicles were relabelled several times without being technically changed. The same locomotive can therefore appear under three or four designations in different sources.

The second reason is the privatisation of the rail market. Since railway operators have been free to procure, lease and sell vehicles, the class designation is no longer tied to a state railway. Many vehicles today mainly carry their European vehicle number and a keeper marking, while the classic class designation is more a convention of the enthusiast community than an official marking.

The third reason lies in the sources themselves. Databases, lists and collections often also carry designations that were planned, regionally used, or only valid briefly. That’s sensible, because it makes searching easier – but it means that not every designation corresponds to a vehicle you could actually encounter.

For practice, that means adopting a simple stance: the designation is a clue, the vehicle is the proof. Anyone who reads and photographs the number when in doubt can resolve any ambiguity later. Anyone who instead assumes a plausible class may entrench an error that no one can correct any more.

This applies especially to older vehicles, rebuilds and one-offs. It’s precisely there that the marking, the database entry and the everyday designation diverge more often than with current series-built classes. Scepticism here is not a sign of ignorance, but of careful work – and it costs nothing but one extra photo of the data panels.

When the designation and your observation don’t match

How to report a sighting so it stays comprehensible to others is described in the guide to reporting sightings.

Verdict

Not every designation leads to an unambiguous vehicle – and that’s not a shortcoming, but a property of numbering systems that grew organically. In practice this means: don’t rely on the short class designation, but on what’s marked on the vehicle. The twelve-digit number, a photo of the markings and a date are worth more than any classification based on a guess.